(1) This Act may be called the Puducherry Apartment Ownership Act, 1987.
(2) It extends to the whole of the Union territory of Puducherry.
(3) It shall come into force on such date as the Government may, by notification in the Official Gazette, appoint.
Application of the Act
2. This Act applies only to property, the sole owner or all the owners of which submit it to the provisions of this Act by duly executing and registering a Declaration as hereinafter provided:
Provided that no property, shall be submitted to the provisions of this Act, unless it is mainly used or proposed to be used for residential purposes.
Definitions
3. In this Act, unless the context otherwise requires, --
(a) "apartment" means a part of any property, intended for any type of independent use, including one or more rooms or enclosed spaces located on one or more floors or part of parts thereof, in a building, intended to be used for residential purposes and with a direct exit to a public street, road or highway or to a common area leading to such street, road or highway;
(b) "apartment owner" means the person or persons owning an apartment and an undivided interest in the common areas and facilities in the percentage specified and established in the Declaration;
(c) "apartment number" means the number, letter, figure or combination thereof, designating the apartment in the Declaration;
(d) "Association of Apartment Owners" means all the apartment owners acting as a group in accordance with the bye-laws and Declaration;
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(e) "building" means a building containing four or more apartments, or two or more buildings, each containing two or more apartments, with a total of four or more apartments for all such buildings, and comprising a part of the property;
(f) "common areas and facilities", unless otherwise provided in the Declaration or lawful amendments thereto, includes ---
(1) the land on which the building is located;
(2) the foundations, columns, girders, beams, supports, main walls, roofs, halls, corridors, lobbies, stairs, stairways, fire-escapes, entrances and exits of the building;
(3) the basements, cellars, yards, gardens, parking areas and storage spaces;
(4) the premises for the lodging of janitors or persons employed for the management of the property;
(5) installations of central services, such as power, light, gas, hot and cold water, heating, refrigeration, air-conditioning and incinerating;
(6) the elevators, tanks, pumps, motors, fans, compressors, ducts and in general all apparatus and installations existing for common use;
(7) such community and commercial facilities as may be provided for in the Declaration; and
(8) all other parts of the property necessary or convenient to its existence, maintenance and safety, or normally in common use;
(g) "common expenses" includes, --
(1) all sums lawfully assessed against the apartment owners by the Association of Apartment Owners;
(2) expenses of administration, maintenance, repair or replacement of the common areas and facilities;
(3) expenses agreed upon as common expenses by the bye-laws;
(4) expenses declared as common expenses by the provisions of this Act or by the Declaration or the bye-laws;
(h) "common profits" means the balance of all income, rents, profits and revenues from the common areas and facilities remaining after the deduction of the common expenses;
(i) "competent authority" means the relation to buildings constructed or to be constructed by the Housing Board, the Secretary of the Housing Board and in any other case, the Registrar of Co-operative Societies as defined in the Puducherry Co-operative Societies Act, 1972 (Act No. 7 of 1973.);
(j) "Declaration" means the instrument by which the property is submitted to the provisions of this Act, as hereinafter provided, and such Declaration as from time to time may be lawfully amended;
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(k) "Government" means the Administrator of the Union territory of Puducherry appointed under article 239 of the Constitution;
(l) "Housing Board" means the Housing Board constituted under the Puducherry Housing Board Act, 1973 (Act No. 7 of 1974).
(m) "joint family" means an undivided Hindu family, and in the case of other persons, a group or unit, the members of which are by custom joint in possession of residence;
(n) "limited common areas and facilities" means those common areas and facilities designated in the Declaration as reserved for use of certain apartment or apartments to the exclusion of the other apartments;
(o) "majority" or "majority of apartment owners" means the apartment owners with fifty-one per cent or more of the votes in accordance with the percentages assigned in the Declaration to the apartments for voting purposes;
(p) "person" includes a joint family;
(q) "prescribed" means prescribed by rules made under this Act;
(r) "property" means the land, the building, all improvements and structures appurtenant thereto, owned in freehold or held on lease or as occupant under any law relating to land revenue and all easements, rights and appurtenances belonging thereto, and all articles of personal property intended for use in connection therewith, which have been or are intended to be submitted to the provisions of this Act.
Status of apartments
4. Each apartment, together with its undivided interest in the common areas and facilities, appurtenant to such apartment, shall for all purposes constitute heritable and transferable immovable property within the meaning of any law for the time being in force in the territory, and accordingly, an apartment owner may transfer his apartment and the percentage of undivided interest in the common areas and facilities appurtenant to such apartment by way of sale, mortgage, lease, gift, exchange or in any other manner whatsoever in the same manner, to the same extent and subject to the same rights, privileges, obligations, liabilities, legal proceedings and remedies as any other immovable property, or make a bequest of it under the laws applicable to the transfer and succession of immovable property.
Ownership of apartments